If you you’re not tracking your online reputation, you might be scratching your head when you see a sudden decrease in customers and revenue. For restaurants, 95% of dissatisfied customers will not tell the business directly; instead, they tell others offline and online in the form of reviews. In the world of search and Google, that means when people search for your business, the customer reviews that come right to the top may have equal or more weighting than all your other advertising and branding efforts. For many businesses and products, these online reviews are good since they contribute more to online purchasing decisions than ads, but if the reviews are bad then what’s a consumer to think? What if you don’t even have a web presence and the bad reviews occupy the top spot in the Google search?

According to Nielsen and WebVisible, 70 percent of those with internet access use online searches to find offline services.

A couple weeks I had a little rant about my dentist experience. Before I went to the dentist, I did a quick Google search and didn’t see a website or reviews so I wasn’t able to make a totally informed decision. Now when you do the google search, guess what comes up….my little ranting review. What are the 70 percent of internet users going to think when they search for the business?

I’m surprised I haven’t received any comment or email from them yet. I guess not everyone thinks to do the Google vanity search…

Businesses shouldn’t fear online reviews though. Sure, bad reviews sting at first, but they can be turned around into positives. There’s 2 things going for a business regarding user generated reviews:

1. Reviews are conversations. Participate in them!
2. Reviewers are people. Treat them nicely and respectfully and they may change their minds.

If your business made a mistake, apologize. Make it up to the customer and they’ll probably forgive you, maybe even turn into a loyal customer. The bad review can just as easily turn into a glowing story about how the company cares so much about customers that they did everything they could to make one unsatisfied customer happy. Everyone loves those stories. Blogs let anyone comment, and most review sites (like Menuism) let restaurant owners join for free and reply to user reviews.

If you don’t know how to track what people are saying, here are 2 services we use:

1. Serph – With Serph, you can set up an RSS feed to get updates of your company name mentions on the web. It seems to find things amazingly fast.
2. Google Alerts – Google lets you set up email alerts of mentions of your company. The mentions don’t seem as timely as Serph’s, but it seems to find some pretty obscure ones.

What other ways do people monitor and manage their online reputation?

- Justin

Like most people who spend any amount of time online, I’ve become desensitized to online advertising. When viewing sites nowadays, my brain subconsciously identifies those IAB-standard graphic ads and blocks them from my attention. And the ones that expand to cover meaningful content just have me hunting for the tiny “x (close this)” link.

So I was surprised to find myself mesmerized by the set of flashing, shifting, smiley-face-wearing buttocks blatantly plastered all over the pages of Salon and other (reputable) sites this morning.

Upon very careful inspection, I saw it was an ad for the Toto Washlet, an all-in-one toilet seat/bidet/dryer. While other expert blogs had mixed opinions about the ads, I think they’re fanny-tastic. They’re eye-catching and simple, and combine sex appeal with humor better than anything I’ve seen in a long time.

It turns out these online ads are part of a larger campaign by ML Rogers in New York, which launched today by unveiling 2-story buttocks in ads overlooking Times Square. Given the placement of the physical and online ads, the message is certainly one of high-end luxury. The Washlet website, www.cleanishappy.com, fleshes it out (har har) – pleasant faces and voices match the pleasant buttocks, and soothing music prepares you to revel in the life-changing abilities of a fancy toilet seat. The um, tongue-in-cheek attitude is obvious on the site as well, with statements like “Washlet’s the bathroom fixture with one fixation… your happiness”. I love it – maybe one day I’ll get one to celebrate Menuism.

Flash and flesh aside, the ultimate measure of an ad campaign is sales and awareness. Time will tell how well this campaign translates into sales of the product – I’ll check back on it in a few months. But as for awareness, I bet this is gonna be successful – you’re reading this, aren’t you?

What other catchy campaigns have you seen?

-john

Punch 1) Beautifully lined up bacon. While I was taking a picture, the booth lady asked if I wanted a t-shirt. Of course, I said “yes”.

Punch 2) The Gusto shirt. If you can’t read it, it says: “Eat More Pork Be a Better Lover“.

What a cool shirt! I can’t believe she had them hiding under the table. She should have been handing them out to anyone who tried the bacon (although I didn’t try it since I was already stuffed). There were probably a dozen or so pork companies there all serving bacon, sausage and ham, but Gusto is the only one I remember because of their brand. They’re even getting some free publicity with this blog post. It takes more time and effort to brand creatively, but it’s worth it if people are going to remember you just a bit more than your competition.

If you haven’t seen my NRA show pics yet, I uploaded a few more to flickr.

- Justin

BTW, if anyone knows where I can find that Chipotle pork song, let me know. You know, the one that goes “pork on the end of my fork…”

Another great example is Costco. From an Barron’s article:

As a matter of corporate policy, Costco refuses to mark up any product by more than 15% above its cost. When the company signed a new contract in 2005 with a supplier for Brooks Bros.-style men’s cotton and button-down shirts, and got a significant price reduction for a massive two-year order, it immediately cut the price of the shirts to $12.99 from $17.99, notes Richard Galanti, Costco’s chief financial officer. Other retailers might have phased in the reduction and captured added profit, but that’s not the Costco way.

When you don’t milk your customers every chance you get, you’re rewarded with loyalty and repeat business that’s worth more in the long run.

Do you know of any other good examples?

- Justin

One thing we’ve definitely learned is to keep moving forward, and in that vein, we’re super excited to announce the first monthly Menuism Food Fight! You might have heard about it on the Menuism Blog, but a good thing bears repeating: Eat PANCAKES and win prizes! In honor of National Pancake Week (Feb 18-24), we’re looking for the BEST pancake in Seattle, Chicago, New York and San Francisco, and you can win by just eating pancakes and reviewing them on Menuism. You can win even if you’re not a pancake fan – just refer a winner and you’ll win as well. So get out there and spread the word, or check the press release or contest page for more details!

Publicity in all forms is great, and we’re really excited to be getting Food Fight coverage from the awesome guys at Tech Cocktail and WindyBits. However, you know you’ve really made it when your name shows up on a banana, courtesy of the fine folks at BananaName:

This is proof positive that Menuism’s Food Fight is something to go “bananas” over… sorry, couldn’t resist.

- John & Justin

In preparation for these and future promotional activities, we designed a sleek, black business card that could be used to promote Menuism and also be useful for the recipient, with a nifty tip chart on the back. We chose Vistaprint to print our cards, and in typical Two-Bit Operation fashion we procrastinated until the last minute and had to opt for the rush shipping. To our surprise, Christmas came early this year, and our big card order arrived today! We rabidly tore apart the packaging and found the following:

It wasn’t bad, but it definitely wasn’t as sleek nor as black as we had hoped. What’s even odder was the backside color was a different shade than the front, though our original images were both jet black. (Vistaprint will be hearing from us…) Who knew that gray was the new black? Regardless, we’re satisfied that the cards are at lease usable – we hope people like and use the tip chart. Got any suggestions for the next batch of cards? What other interesting things have you seen on business cards?

-John

p.s. If you want to help spread the word about Menuism, or just need a useful tip chart in your wallet, let us know – we’ll send you some cards!

Herb Kelleher, b. 1931, co-founder, Chairman, former CEO of Southwest Airlines

Background

• Born and raised in New Jersey. Bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University and JD from New York University.
• Grew up with his mother, who stressed that individuals matter and the value of working for the common good.
• Worked as a clerk for the New Jersey Supreme Court and in private practice as an attorney.
• Started Southwest Airlines with Rollin King in 1967.

Challenges & Successes

• When Southwest started, prices for interstate air travel were dictated by the federal government. The original idea behind Southwest was to sidestep the regulations and offer greater value to customers by operating only within Texas.
• Pushed the concept of point-to-point flights between smaller airports which allowed quicker turnaround times, as opposed to the traditional hub-and-spoke model centered around major metropolitan airports.
• Established carriers, fearing the new business, filed lawsuit after lawsuit to prevent Southwest from ever flying. As investors balked, Kelleher (also the general counsel at the time) volunteered to work without pay and eat the legal costs himself.
• After 4+ years of legal battles, Southwest Airlines finally starts flying in 1971.
• Through sticking to his principles and by force of personality, Kelleher built the widely-respected company culture of Southwest, focusing on shared ownership and empowering employees to go above and beyond for the customers.
• In 1988, Southwest was the first airline to win the one-month Triple Crown service award for Best On-Time Record, Best Baggage Handling, and Fewest Customer Complaints. Southwest goes on to win 5 consecutive annual Triple Crown awards from 1992 to 1996.
• Kelleher helps Southwest pioneer senior discounts, Fun Fares, same-day air freight delivery, and ticketless travel.

Key Lessons

• Employees matter the most – not customers nor shareholders. Great, motivated employees will do what it takes to make the customer happy, which in turn will make shareholders happy.
• Personality matters. A company should have a personality that a customer will enjoy, remember and prefer for her next purchase. A company must build trust with the employees so they will be empowered to act as necessary on behalf of the customer. Towards the latter, Southwest has a track record of providing the best job security (as well as ownership and benefits) in the industry.
• Inspire your employees towards the greater good. In Kelleher’s words, “One of the managers in our People Department once said, ‘The important thing is to take the bricklayer and make him understand that he’s building a home, not just laying bricks.’ So we take the building a home approach: This is what you’re doing not only for yourself but for society: giving people who’d otherwise not be able to travel the opportunity to do so…”

This summary is just the 30,000-foot view of Herb Kelleher’s lessons and accomplishments. He’s accomplished an amazing number of things and has the outgoing personality to talk about most of them. Some good resources for further reading are:

• Herb Kelleher on the Record (BusinessWeek interview)
• A Culture of Commitment by Herb Kelleher
• Chasing the Sun (PBS series on innovators)
• Southwest Airlines history

-JL

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The recording lasts an hour and can be a bit dry at times, but there’s a lot of good nuggets of wisdom, like where your company should be before being appealing to investors (when you have decent customer traction). Even though we’re not looking for investors right now the clip is still useful to help learn about the rules (and rulemakers) of the startup game. Check it out if you’ve got the time.

-JL

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Here are the values for some domains that I tried:

• AOL.com: $981,722
• Microsoft.com: $1,644,314
• Google.com: $2,840,064
• Yahoo.com: $1,393,944
• twobitoperation.com: $14,406

Based on the value for this site, it’s obvious LeapFish has some significant errors with undervaluation.   Still, the attributes that they use to make their valuations seem pretty reasonable – I’ll definitely use their site when choosing the next domain name to register.  Let us know what your site’s worth!

-JL

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What’s your vote?

- JC

Tags: Logo, Brand, Marketing

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